Bauer taking all rights

I have nothing positive to say about this, so I'll just copy today's email correspondence between myself and Tracie Couper who is the Features editor Spirit & Destiny and then go for a very long walk.

Hi Tracie, 

I run the Womagwriter blog (https://womagwriter.blogspot.com) which passes on information to those wishing to submit fiction to the various women’s magazines. Today I’ve been contacted by several people telling me that you now require all rights to the stories you buy – and that in some cases this is being imposed after acceptance. I’m sure that last bit can’t be correct, but would very much welcome a clarification about the rights you now require – and any other information you feel may be of use to writers who’d like to submit to your magazine.

Best wishes,

Patsy Collins

Dear Patsy

The current situation is that any article appearing in the magazine will require the writer/contributor to sign an agreement, giving us all rights to the article/story/feature. This is because Spirit & Destiny is now syndicated in other countries, including Australia and New Zealand.

Regards

Tracie Couper

Features editor Spirit & Destiny 

Hi Tracie,

Thanks for your reply. 

Can you explain why it’s ‘all rights’ and not ‘first rights with extensions’ as is the case with many other magazines in the same position? 

Best wishes,

Patsy 

Hi Patsy

This is the agreement that has been drawn up by our legal team and applies to all Bauer publications.

Tracie 

Another magazine taking all rights!

I've heard from several sources that Spirit and Destiny magazine now require all rights to any stories they publish.

'irrevocably and unconditionally assign to us in perpetuity by way of present assignment of present and future copyright, the entire copyright and all other rights and title of any kind that you have in the Commissioned Works throughout the world (including any amendments and extensions to that copyright). You hereby irrevocably waive any and all moral rights you have in the Commissioned Works to the fullest extent possible throughout the world.'

I've also heard that authors have been asked to sign these new contracts AFTER stories have been accepted for publication! I'm contacting the magazine to ask for clarification and will let you know their response – if any.

UPDATE

I've had a reply from Tracie Couper at Spririt and Destiny.

'The current situation is that any article appearing in the magazine will require the writer/contributor to sign an agreement, giving us all rights to the article/story/feature. This is because Spirit & Destiny is now syndicated in other countries, including Australia and New Zealand.'

There's been another update – please see the more recent post.

Over to You

This month's discussion topic – Do you write your first drafts with a pen, on a computer, or in some other way?

Here's another random photo for use as a story prompt. 

Please share success (or otherwise!) report any womag news, tips, advice you may have, make womag related comments or observations and ask questions – and answer them too if you can help.


 (If you have news or a question relating to a particular magazine, it's also fine to add it as a comment to the latest post for that magazine.)

Good start to the year

I have a story in the current (February) edition of Woman's Weekly. It was accepted over a year ago under the old terms. Voodoo Val is about a change of management upsetting all the workers, and someone deciding to release tension by sticking pins into an image of the new boss. There's a happy ending not because of any black magic, but because everyone stuck together.
In other news, I've had acceptances so far from three different womags. Two more editors are either holding onto stories for possible use, or have passed them on to the senior team for consideration. 
Thanks to Sharon Boothroyd's guest post I've also had a story accepted by Love Sunday magazine (it comes with the Sunday People newspaper.) I gave it a try for research purposes and as a result will have a story in the 20th January issue. I'm hoping it might encourage more people to take a look at my books.
Guest posts, relevant to womag writing, are always welcome. If you'd like to share information or an experience, pass on tips or news, even just ask a question do get in touch. (Auto correct keeps trying to change womag to wombat – if you do happen to be a wombat who writes fiction, I'd be delighted to hear from you too!)
There's a People's Friend special, due out on 23rd January which will contain one of my stories. That's a 1,200 word one. It seems they still get a good supply of these and that longer stories may stand a better chance.
How are you getting on so far this year? Have you submitted anything, had replies, or are you expecting work to be published soon?

The other side of the desk

I'm sure many of you will remember Clare Cooper from her time on the fiction team of Woman's Weekly. Today she's sharing her experiences of life on the other side of the submissions desk.

Wanted: Writers to fill pages in magazines. Must have thick skins and be prepared to take criticism, rejection and incredibly long waiting times on the chin. Must learn to bite their tongues and not get stroppy, or they will be sent to the naughty desk. Must accept that not everything they write is going to see the light of day but must put their keen disappointment to one side, keep the faith and carry on regardless. Is there anybody out there mad enough to take on such a seemingly thankless job?

As I have mentioned before on here, the best part of my previous job as Deputy Fiction Editor on Woman’s Weekly was reading and selecting the short stories that appeared in the magazine each week and also in our monthly Fiction Special. The second-best bit was contacting the writers to let them know we wanted to buy their story. We always marvelled at how our brilliant band of writers continued to rise to the challenge and provide us with a never-ending supply of great fiction.

Fast-forward a year (and a bit more) since I left my job. Let’s face it, my previous role sounds quite cushy from where I’m sitting now, not doing a great deal and spending unhealthy amounts of time on social media. I have an idea for a novel but I’m stuck on it at the moment. I don’t feel motivated. How do people get inspired? Where do their ideas come from? Where do all those thousands of words come from? Do they feel like failures if they haven’t kept to their self-imposed deadlines, while others are getting on with it and producing their third novel in the same amount of time? It feels as though the world and his wife are writing books and social media is full of them promoting their work and plugging their friends’ work, to boot.

It’s all rather daunting and disheartening and, while I am struggling to get my novel idea off the starting block, I have been mulling over something I wrote on this website at the beginning of 2018, about getting writing fit for the coming year. Inspired by some kind comments, I thought I would try and see if anyone would like to publish it. I have never had to put myself “out there” and sell something to anybody, other than within my old company and to people I already knew, so it took a lot of nerve and effort to write the email and send my feature off into the ether – well, to Jonathan Telfer at Writing Magazine, anyway. To my relief, he liked it and it’s going into the February issue. Then, blow me if he didn’t get in touch to ask me to write about something else – for the same issue, as it turns out. Typical! You wait a year, and then two come along at once…

Yes, the view from the other side of the desk is more than a bit scary and it’s very early days, but I’d like to think there will be more literary gems dropping from my computer keyboard at some point. If not, and I’ve peaked too soon, at least I now have a much better understanding of what it’s like for everyone else – and I respect and salute you all! I feel I have an awful long way to go. Now, where did I put the application for that seemingly thankless job?

The February issue of Writing Magazine containing Clare's article is available from newsagents now. You might also like to visit her blog Hampton Caught.

Happy New Year!

If you're interested in a quick look back on my writing year and learning some of my plans for 2019 take a look here.

Happy New Year!

All the best

This blog is going to Take a Break as My Weekly time will be taken up with other things for a while. I'd like to thank everyone who has contributed and supported Womagwriter over the last year – by leaving comments, providing guest posts or information (even if it wasn't quite Weekly News ;-) ) or helping to publicise it. You People are my Friends!


(If anyone has womag related news (especially good news!) or would like to do a guest post which they feel will be of interest to readers of this blog, I'll still be happy to post them up – I just won't be actively searching for news and regularly checking all the info on here is up to date myself. My other writing blog will remain active.)

Allas, I can't guarantee it (That's Life! I suppose)  but I wish YOU success with your writing and hope that Yours will be a happy 2019. If you stay In the Moment and trust in Spirit and Destiny, it could happen.

Over to You

Here's another monthly random photo for use as a story prompt. 

It's also your chance to share success (or otherwise) ask questions*, report any womag news, tips, advice you may have, or make womag related comments or observations. (If you have news or a question relating to a particular magazine, it's also fine to add it as a comment to the latest post for that magazine.)

*If you can answer these, please do.

How has your writing year been? Are you planning any changes for 2019?

Top tip for subbing to The Weekly News

I'm very pleased to have had my story Jack and Jill accepted for The Weekly News. It will be in the 22nd December issue (possibly under a different title). I very nearly missed out though, as Shirley Blair only just spotted that it was a Christmas story in time for it to be included. 

Along with the acceptance she gave me this bit of advice, which I'm repeating here with her permission –

Top tip:  it does help if you mention if it’s for a particular season in the subject line or your email. Then it’s more likely to catch my eye in time.

Shirley is also fiction editor for The People's Friend and blogs about that, so do take a look for more writing and submission tips, plus story starter ideas.

Allers

Allers is the Finnish sister magazine to the Swedish Allas. Under the terms of the standard contract with Aller media, a story sold to one magazine can be used by another within the group. That recently happened to one of my stories, which originally appeared in Allas two years ago.

I love the illustration!

If my friend Beatrice Charles hadn't spotted it on Readly I wouldn't have known about it. There's no requirement for them to notify authors this has happened. There's no requirement for them to pay extra either. Still, it's nice have more readers (who knows, some might go on to discover my books) and to be able to say my short stories have been published in nine different countries (I'm counting the UK as one.)

One thing to be aware of, if you sell rights allowing the story to be published elsewhere (as is the case with most contracts) this will restrict where else you can submit it. For example I couldn't offer first Australian rights for a story sold to Take A Break (or the Fiction Feast) in the UK as the publishers may already have published it in one of their Australian magazines without my knowledge.

This doesn't restrict your right to offer it to places which don't require first rights, or to use the story yourself somewhere. (Of course if you've sold all rights you needn't worry about any of this as you no longer own the story and can't offer or use it anywhere at all.)

Free ebook

Are We Nearly Famous? is a free ebook, written by me and three of my writing friends. It contains a short story, some information about how we got started as writers and where we're going, and a sample chapter from each of us.

This collection of short stories is about journeys; literal, metaphorical and literary. Those both of the characters and the authors.

Ailsa travels to Scotland and begins the journey of recovery after life-saving surgery. The Smith family take two trips in one, and their reactions to each bring them closer as a family. Esperanza doesn’t just switch locations but swaps one life for another, each change taking her away from everything she knows and ever closer to the independence she needs to be truly happy.

In Italy, Pedro learns about the cycle of life, death and rebirth. Lisa’s journey also begin with a death, which leads her on a search for the truth about her own life.

Marty, just like her creator, moves to the Island of La Palma and takes strides forward in both her career and love life. Although Saffy and Jess both remain in the United Kingdom, their own emotional journeys are similar in several ways. They each want to make a difference with their work, and meet men who share this passion and ignite their own.

Patsy, Rosemary, Sheila and Lynne are four friends who, although successful in specific writing fields, aren’t yet well known to the general reading public. Together we’re raising awareness of our work, and hope you’ll help us do the same by reading this free collection, telling others about it and leaving us a review. We’re not really asking ‘Are We Nearly Famous?’ as we know the answer!

You can download it for free here.

Do you have a book you want to promote? If so, feel free to mention it in a comment to this post – and if you've not already seen Sharon's gust post about a way to get your book mentioned for free in a high circulation national magazine, do take a look.

Guest post and new 'market'

Today's guest is Sharon Boothroyd, who is sharing details of a new (to this blog) short story outlet.

Free Book Publicity

It's great when you come across a free opportunity to plug your book. I stumbled across the Love Sunday fiction slot on social media a while ago.

Love Sunday is the supplement (a magazine) of The Sunday People newspaper. They publish a short story once a week. It's open to any genre.

If your story is chosen for publication, sadly there's no payment for the writer – however, they do offer a free book plug. (An advert in a national magazine or newspaper would cost hundreds of pounds – far more than most of us can earn from selling one story.)

This is a national popular newspaper, so for me, it was worth having a think about finding a home for some unsold womag work and grabbing some precious publicity for our charity e- anthology, Paws For Thought. My hubby and I produced this e-book in 2017. Income generated from sales is donated to the RSPCA. 

There's a pick n' mix of fiction, from ghosts and twists, to romance and crime. It includes work from well- known womag writers such as Patsy Collins, Fran Tracey, Alan Williams,Tara Westgate, Beatrice Charles and Jacqui Cooper. Please check out our website for further information: http://ryecorn.orgfree.com

I was delighted when Flavia (She's in charge of the fiction section) accepted a story of mine called Skin Deep. 

When it appeared, it was really nicely illustrated and I was pleased with how it was set out. I'm more than happy to consider submitting another story in the future.

If you'd like to submit a story to Love Sunday (who unlike some magazines don't take all rights) they require a max of 1, 500 words. Please email Flavia: f.bertolini (at) mirror.co.uk

Found Sparkle?

We've just been on holiday (no, not another one – the trip to Scotland was a working trip ... mostly). Whilst in Greece I spotted a newsagent stand with British mags on it and couldn't resist flicking through to see if I was in any of them and was surprised to see I was (although not as amazed as I appear in the photo). The magazines must take a while to reach Greece.

Have you ever seen UK magazines while abroad?

Or looked at the magazines published in the countries you've visited?

For those wondering, the story was in Woman's Weekly (submitted and accepted under the old terms) and appeared in the UK a couple of weeks ago.

Paragraph indents, or lack of

Hi everyone - greetings from Greece! (I know those aren't Greek flags, but I wanted something to wave at you (and I haven't downloaded yesterday's photos yet – we were too busy winning the quiz.) Can you tell from them where we were a couple of days ago?)

I was asked a question via twitter, which I've only just seen. It went something like this ...  'When an editor asks for no paragraph indents, what should I do? Add a space or symbol? It looks odd with nothing.'

As one person is wondering, it seems likely others are too, so I've decided to answer on here. All you do is leave out the indents (or if, as is likely, you can't help but put them in as you write, take them out again afterwards).

If you think about it logically, the editor will have asked for the story to be sent without indents because she doesn't want them (if you look in the magazines, many don't use them). If you have indents, or anything else including blank lines, then these will have to be removed. That takes time; not much time per story perhaps, but it is 'one more thing'.

I do agree that it looks odd – and I confess that I can't write without something to diferentiate the paragraphs, but I do try to remove them before submitting if that's what the guidelines request.

Anyone there?

Is it worth me writing posts this month, or are you all doing NaNo and so too busy to read them?